Fear The Fans!
by Kidagakashantelast
Summary: When the cast of Bloodlust is put on display for millions of fans, pity the people who have to set it up...
1. first Days

(Disclaimer: I do not own any of these characters except for Josh and the  
fans)  
  
Fear the Fans! For they will eventually abduct you, tie you up in a closet, and look in to  
admire you from time to time.  
  
D sighed heavily with boredom; he fiddled irritably with the glove covering his left hand, ignoring the pitiful pleading emitting from beneath the fabric at the same time, before looking up again. "The damned room is certainly big enough so why does that moron have to be irritating so close to me?" D wondered, staring at Kyle as the red head tore across the large elegant room, desperately trying to escape from the make up artist who had been trying all evening to re-braid Kyle's hair. "Why doesn't he just LET her already, it's a horrible mess anyway..." D thought angrily as a table went flying past him, naturally he didn't even flinch. Said table happened to land millimeters from Leila (who did flinch...), causing her hackles to rise immediately in absolute fury, anyone watching will tell you that it reminded them strongly of a certain prince named Ashitaka. Battle aura glowing evilly Leila stomped over to Kyle and promptly slapped him hard across the face. "Idiot!!" WHAM!!! The sound of the slap echoed off of the walls, while everyone watched as the force from the slap caused Kyle to perform a stunning 360 before falling off of the chair he had been standing on.  
  
Leila stalked away looking as smug as possible, while behind her the make up lady pounced on the temporarily immobile Kyle who was whimpering and asking for a license plate number in a confused and lost tone. "Really Leila..." a soft voice whispered reproachfully, causing Leila to turn towards the person who had spoken. "Was that truly necessary?" Charlotte continued, standing gracefully to look down on Leila, who was, in fact, three inches shorter. "He was only trying to preserve something special to him, you heard him, the last person to tie his braid was his mother..." Leila presented Charlotte with a marvelous I really couldn't possibly care less facial expression before walking over to her previous station by the soda machine and shoving Mashira, who had been enjoying the cooling sensation of the icy machine against his overheated body, away from it. Mashira looked pouty as Leila took his spot, but refrained from commenting as he had witnessed Kyle's lack of defense against those slaps.  
  
Meier seemed to glide as he moved over to a tall man with a clipboard standing at the back of the room near the large double doors that led outside. "Tell me again Josh..." Meier murmured, raising an elegant eyebrow. "Why it is that we must all meet these so called fans..." Josh sighed and rubbed his temples to ward off a headache. This was the fifth time Meier had asked this question in the last hour, he didn't seem to understand that he had been in a popular movie and that people wanted to meet him in person. In fact at first none of them had understood, the fact that half of them had been dead coupled with the new technology that allowed people to meet cartoon characters in the flesh, had confused the living daylights out of the entire cast. None of them had believed the whole "cartoon" thing until Josh had finally broken down and shown it to them, that (at least) had stopped them all from trying to murder each other, and given him a small break while they all accepted the information. "I need a new job..." Josh groaned, walking away from the miffed aristocratic vampire and nearly tripping over D's horse, which was lying on the air conditioning vent.  
  
Josh watched as it whinnied in an offended sort of way before falling asleep again. With a soft grunt, Josh vaulted over the cyber horse only to glance up and see Borgoff striding quickly towards him. "Oh no..." Josh whimpered, he was about to try to vault back over the horse when Borgoff clamped a large hand onto his shoulder. "Hey, are you sure we didn't exist until five hours ago?" He asked looking very put out and confused. Josh sighed, sounding exasperated, as he swept his hands through his shoulder length brown hair. "Yes, I've told you that already...twice." Borgoff snorted, now looking pissed. "You expect me to believe that? I know darn well I was alive before now, I remember it!" He growled, tightening his grip on Josh's shoulder. "Of course you remember!" Josh cried, wriggling out of Borgoff's grasp. "You're supposed to, that's the point! So that when the fans meet you you're all realistic!" Borgoff blinked. "So this is all for the stupid fan people? Like, like a-a carnival attraction?" He asked, sounding dumbfounded. "Yes!" Josh exclaimed. "Now you're catching on, great, so go explain it to everyone else and leave me alone!" Josh turned abruptly to walk away and promptly tripped over the cyber horse. "Augh!" Josh cried and began kicking the poor dazed horse while he cussed it out. Three seconds later Josh found himself dangling four feet off the floor while D held onto his shirtfront. Terrified, Josh dropped his clipboard and tried to pry D's hands off. D stared at him for a few moments before simply stating. "Don't touch my horse..." He then dropped Josh onto his clipboard and walked gracefully away. Still looking a bit lost Borgoff shook his head and walked back over to Nolt and Caroline, both of whom he had been talking with earlier, and held a whispered conversation with them, they all looked very serious. Finally all three nodded and Caroline flowed over to Josh, yanked him off the floor, handed him his clipboard, and asked in her sultry voice, "When are we getting the food you promised us five hours ago?" Relived that this was all they wanted Josh dusted himself off. "Should be soon Caroline." He replied. "I ordered it about an hour ago, but it was a large order so just hold on a bit longer and I'm sure it'll be here." Caroline nodded; looking placated, and flowed back over to Borgoff and Nolt.  
  
"Finally..." Josh grumbled. "Now all I have to do is go look for the food, and find tomorrow's schedule..." He began walking towards the doors that led into the rest of the building when he was tackled from behind and slammed into the floor. "What the blazes!?!" Josh howled, twisting to see who it was only to be hefted up and hugged tightly. "Augh!" Josh cried tearing himself away from the person and spinning around. Grove smiled happily at Josh before clapping his hands together once, in an utterly adorable fashion. "Thank you!" Grove cried happily before hugging Josh again. "Get off!" Josh shouted squirming. "I told you already, I was ordered to, it wasn't a personal favor, so stop hugging me!" Grove just grinned. "I know, I know!" He said, still not relinquishing his grip. "But thanks to you I'm healthy again! Look! I can walk!" He cried excitedly, running in a circle. "Great...really fantastic, but I had to, otherwise it would have been too hard for the fans to get to you, and it was just my job, so stop hugging me!" Josh said angrily, stomping off and out the doors to find the food, leaving Grove looking slightly hurt but really too happy with his functional body to care.  
Two hours later Josh still had not returned and everyone was feeling extremely ravenous. Kyle lay upside down on a long empty table, clutching his stomach and groaning pitifully. "I'm so hungryyyyyy!" He wailed, banging his feet against the table. "Somebody please, feed meeee!" Caroline rolled her eyes and tilted the table so that Kyle slid off onto the floor. "Stop whining Kyle, Josh said the food would be here soon." She purred, slinking over to Bengee, who was currently trying to slide under the door that had no crack at the bottom and was locked. "If only this wasn't steel..." He muttered. "Then we could just break out and eat Josh." "Oh Bengee, that's horrible!" Charlotte exclaimed. "Don't say things like that, I'm sure that dear Josh will be here again soon!" She pleaded. Bengee snorted, looking unconvinced and glared at the door before getting another soda from the machine and chugging it. Mashira stood and began pacing again, muttering to himself, tail whipping from side to side in agitation. "That stupid human, not feeding us! Of all the nerve! Stupid human..." Meier and D were conversing in the far left corner of the room in order to avoid everyone else. "So, D. Do you believe that Josh person? Or do you think he left us here for dead?" D looked thoughtful for a moment before replying. "His job seems very stressful, perhaps he was simply sidetracked." Meier nodded, that was a good enough explanation for him...but not for Leila. She was in the far right corner of the room plotting Josh's imminent demise while Grove tried to talk her out of it.  
  
Mashira was just completing his thirty-sixth round when the door opened and Josh sauntered in. Everyone turned to stare at him balefully. "Dear lord you had better have food..." Bengee muttered. Josh gulped visibly. "I do! I do, I do! Don't kill me!" Just as this was said a buffet table was wheeled inside, and was followed by two more. Drooling, Kyle trailed after the tables until the waitress nearest him looked back, saw him, screamed, and bolted out the door. "Wait!" Josh cried, running after her. "I still need you to bring out the rest!" One of the other waitresses snorted irritably, whacked Kyle in the face and proceeded to chew him out about waiting until he was served. Finally the food was all uncovered. "Ok guys," Josh said proudly. "Dig in!" But nobody did... "What is this?" Caroline asked sounding stunned. "Some kind of cruel joke?" Josh looked crestfallen. "What do you mean?" He asked, he was really getting depressed; it had taken hours to get all this food here. "What is this stuff?" Kyle asked poking at a pepperoni pizza and trying to decipher what it was. Grove stared at a basket of KFC not quite knowing what to do with it, it smelled great, but it looked so freaky... Everyone gave Josh the puppy face. Josh put his head in his hands and tried to suppress a scream. "Its FOOD! You know, the stuff you were threatening me for?!?" Borgoff looked bemusedly at Josh, then at the popcorn shrimp. "You sure?" Josh had had enough. "Look!" He cried. "It is food, I swear! This stuff is pizza, that's fried chicken, those are steak subs, and that's fish ok?" Everyone blinked, then dove for the food. Josh sighed in relief and began heading towards the doors again when he felt a hand on his shoulder. "Excuse me..." Josh turned to find Meier staring at him. "Um, yes?" Josh asked. "What am I supposed to eat?" Meier whimpered pitifully. Josh looked lost. "There's plenty over there." He said nodding towards the crowded tables. Meier raised an eyebrow. "I'm a vampire, Josh..." Josh's eyes widened as realization dawned upon him. "Oh sh**!!" He cried. "I totally forgot!" Meier looked hopelessly at Josh. "So...what you're saying is, no food for me?" Josh glanced around frantically, thinking fast. You could practically hear his brain whirring. Meier sighed resignedly. "Oh well, I suppose I could just eat one of those Markus brothers but Charlotte's gone and become such good friends with them that I hate to-" "No! Nonono, that won't be necessary I-I'll go find something wait here!" Josh raced off as Meier smirked; he knew he'd get his way with that comment.  
  
Meanwhile the buffet tables may as well have been a battle scene, everyone was fighting for food, and it was a darn good thing all of their weapons had been confiscated. Kyle was in a life and death struggle with Leila over the last slice of pepperoni pizza, Mashira and Nolt were facing off over a bucket of barbequed chicken (and while they did so Bengee ate it), and Caroline was happily munching on the popcorn shrimp while Borgoff nursed his freshly bruised ribs. The only ones not fighting were D, Charlotte, and Grove. Charlotte simply asked Meier to bring them some food and he did so without being bothered by the others. They munched happily on the chicken fried rice and lasagna without quarrel, Grove and Charlotte conversing happily while D ate in silence, listening in every now and then to the lighthearted conversation of the peace loving pair and secretly enjoying it. Their talk was only interrupted once when Kyle flew backwards out of nowhere into the lasagna, preformed a backward roll, slammed into the wall, and fell flat onto his face whimpering. "Kyle!" Grove cried worriedly, running over to his brother and helping him up. Kyle was gasping for air, apparently winded with lasagna dripping down his back, as Leila walked happily off munching the last piece of pepperoni pizza. "M-my p- pizza..." Kyle whimpered staring after Leila with an incredibly sad look on his face. "Poor Kyle..." Grove whispered in a compassionate sort of way, patting his older brother's bright red hair gently. Meier rolled his eyes and went to get some more food for the group now that the lasagna was gone. He returned with a cherry pie that everyone seemed to enjoy immensely, Kyle quickly got over the loss of his pizza, and even D smiled and joined in the conversation for a while...until the pie was gone. Meier loped off to the door and sat down in front of it waiting for his dinner, gazing sorrowfully at the steel construction for about five minutes until it opened and Josh re entered. "You're back!" Meier cried ecstatically, springing to his feet and looking impatient. "Yes..." Josh said, he looked bedraggled and exhausted. "You'd better appreciate this it took me 45 minutes of my life to convince the blood bank to let me take a withdrawal..." 


	2. Indigestion

(Disclaimer: I do not own any of these characters except for Josh and the  
fans)  
  
Fear the Fans! For they will eventually abduct you, tie you up in a closet, and look in to admire you from time to time.  
  
Forty minutes later all of the food had vanished entirely, everyone looked quite green and on the verge of being sick all over the beautiful Persian rugs spread out across the floor. That is, everyone except for Meier and his plastic baggie of blood (O positive) that he was enjoying immensely. He adored the fact that his food wasn't screaming or trying to take a swing at him, as it usually did. He sat, cross-legged, on one of the long empty rectangular tables near the back of the sparsely furnished room, squeezing the last few drops out of the baggie and grinning happily. He hopped off the table and sauntered gracefully over to an extremely unhappy looking Josh, who was half asleep and drooling all over his clipboard, and tapped him on the shoulder. It took so much effort for poor Josh to perform the task of raising his throbbing head that, if it hadn't been a vampire tapping him, he wouldn't have bothered. "Yes?" Josh croaked, looking half dead. "Is there some other mindless errand you need me to run?" Meier looked a bit taken aback. "No. Um, actually I was just going to thank you." He said, chewing his bottom lip in agitation as he watched Josh slide over onto his side, exhausted. "Fabulous, really, 'night......." The tech mumbled drowsily, he was just starting to doze off again when the walkie- talkie in his back pocket began barking orders at him.  
  
"Henderson! Where the hell are you!?! Why aren't you up front? You have a call from your aunt that's been on hold for thirty minutes! Get you're a** down here now!!" Josh jumped about a foot in the air in complete shock while Meier stared, in utter disbelief, at Josh's talking pocket. Before Meier could ask Josh ran as fast as he could for the door, spewing out a sentence as one word before exiting. "Gottarunbebacklaterguysbye!" The door slammed shut on Josh's shoelace and Meier sighed as he heard the loud thud followed by an even louder bout of cursing and watched the shoelace jerking at the metal surface, like a frightened rabbit caught in a trap, before it ripped in half. He then listened to the tech skidding and crashing down the hallway on the opposite side of the steel door for a time before the noise faded. "You know, I really do feel sorry for that pitiful human boy....." Meier muttered but nobody heard him, they were all too busy racing away from Kyle who had finally lost control of his body's actions, and was vomiting his stomach's contents onto the floor.  
  
D found himself to be, once again, staring contemptuously at the red headed Markus brother who was groaning and clutching his belly in a pitiable fashion on the floor about fifty feet away. Didn't the moron even know the capacity of his own stomach? What an imbecile! To have eaten enough to make himself sick was one thing, but to not even attempt to make it to the provided bathrooms in time was unforgivable, in D's humble opinion. Now they all had to put up with the vile smell of half digested food until the janitor that Josh had called for would arrive. D rolled his eyes and moved even farther away from the queasy figure of Kyle, into a corner with Leila and Bengee. "I swear," D muttered angrily. "If we hadn't promised Josh not to kill them I would start with that one...." Bengee nodded in complete agreement and looked more than a bit vicious while cracking his knuckles, when Leila felt it necessary to step in. "Come on guys......" She murmured, feeling guilty about not sticking up for one of her partners sooner. "He's not that bad all the time, and he usually makes up for his faults in entertainment value..." D nodded, placated for the moment, Kyle was a fairly interesting person and, after all, he had died rather horribly once already. In thinking this D glanced, subconsciously, up at Mashira who was fiddling innocently with the empty soda cans and making a tower out of them with Charlotte, while his tail thumped happily on the floor. Bengee still looked less than appeased and simply glared at Leila before melting into the shadows and sliding away. Leila shuddered and stared after him. "Ugh.....What a freak show..."  
  
Bengee slid through the various shadows on the floors and carpets before stopping in the middle of Kyle's rather uncomfortable looking one. Of all the characters present Bengee was the most resentful of his demise, it had taken Josh (and six heavily armed policemen) quite a long time to convince him not to permanently injure any of the others under a hefty penalty of another death. Bengee rolled his eyes upon recalling this and tried his absolute hardest to contrive a loophole for the situation, when suddenly it hit him. He had promised not to PERMENANTLY injure the others.....slight wounds would heal, would they not? Feeling absolutely gleeful Bengee reached for his weapon, only to remember a few seconds later that it had been confiscated. "Damn." He muttered, grasping for a new solution to his issue with Kyle. He watched the red head whimper and flip onto his back, looking in desperate need of an antacid, when the idea struck him. Bengee had never tried to murder someone through the shadow without his weapon before (it had been specially designed) and wasn't sure if this new plan of assault would work, but oh well, one way to find out. In thinking this Bengee simply raised his fist and whomped Kyle's shadow, as hard as he could, right in the gut. Kyle let out a very strange high-pitched noise, causing everyone to turn and look at him as he curled up on himself yelping. He wasn't the only one either Bengee shot up out of the shadows hissing and clutching his bleeding fist looking anguished as he danced in place, for you see, when you slam your bare fist into a tile floor with cement underneath with all the force you posses, this is what tends to happen. Borgoff put two and two together and looked enraged. "Frickin' monster!" He cried, jumping to his feet upon seeing this was an assault on his family and switching immediately into "older brother attack mode". He still possessed his crossbow (no one had been willing to try and pry it off his arm) but without any arrows it seemed a bit useless. At least, it had seemed useless, until Borgoff saw the pile of pencils on one of the tables. Grabbing them up, he began firing the unsharpened No.2's at Bengee with surprising accuracy, Bengee naturally dodged all of them and, to add insult to injury, threw one back at Borgoff and beaned him on the nose. This led to a wrestling match within seconds, followed by a biting match, and followed by a cursing match, which naturally led to a free for all sudden death sort of thing. Everyone else simply stood and stared, appalled in every sense and unwilling to intervene between the battling twosome. Grove and Caroline moved quickly over to Kyle and dragged him away from the battle scene, lest he become an unwilling participant in the fray. Kyle was sobbing pitifully seeing as he was now suffering from severe heartburn and a bruised abdominal area, Grove patted him on the back gently and Caroline spoke to him sympathetically for a bit, both trying (unsuccessfully) to make him feel better. Meanwhile Meier had finally become fed up with the ongoing fight, and was about to put a halt to it easily when the steel door banged open and Josh strode inside.  
  
Josh had not been prepared to see a two-man war going on upon his return with the janitor. "Dear lord!" He cried racing over to the janitors cart and, grabbing the bucket of water that was used to mop up dirty floors, he quickly dumped it onto the dust cloud of insults and flying fists that was actually Bengee and Borgoff. Bengee shrieked in outrage as the water hit him and he quickly slid as far away from Josh as he could go, straight under the soda machine. Borgoff, trying to stem the heavy flow of blood from his nose, glared resentfully at the twenty one year old tech. "What?!!?" Josh asked, feeling resentful as well. "I go away to take an important phone call, manage to find the only janitor in the entire damn building, stop that freak of nature from ripping your head off, and all you can do is glower at me??" Borgoff scowled. "Don't you dare glare at me!" Josh cried attempting to look threatening, but he could hear the others behind Borgoff sniggering heartily. Irritated, Josh rolled his eyes and turned to tell the janitor where to clean, but the janitor was no longer behind him. Terrified that he might have to clean up Kyle's mess on his own, Josh spun around and instantly found him, offering an extremely grateful Kyle his bottle of Tums. Half an hour later everyone seemed to be mostly back to normal, the floor was cleaned, Kyle's heartburn had dispersed, and Borgoff's nose was not broken and as an added bonus had even stopped bleeding (he was a tad lightheaded from the amount that he lost though). Josh was making some tallies and notes on his clipboard when D sidled over to him. "Yes?" Josh asked upon looking up to find the Dunpeal looming over him. "Need something?" D gazed at Josh and paused for a moment before responding, while he did so Borgoff staggered by in the background, hit a wall and stumbled backwards calling for Leila and begging her to help him locate the bathroom. "I wanted to ask you something." D murmured. "Oh?" Said Josh sounding surprised; this was only the second time D had ever spoken to him. "What's your question?" D smiled softly." Who was the important call from?" 


	3. Movie?

(Disclaimer: don't own vhd; b...*sigh*)  
Fear the Fans  
  
Ah yes, to thank my reviewers of recent times! Seifer vanGriever : Thank you for your review! And don't worry...I watch this  
movie 24/7 too! ^^;;  
Kitala: Wow! Thanks. Repeat reviewers rule! Glad you seem to like it so  
far. Jonquil Dacre: Yay! More repeat reviews! Please don't stop, if you don't I  
won't! Kd Zeal: Thank you for your suggestion, really. As soon as I get a break  
from AP testing I'll go back and fix things!  
Blackjackkat: More repeaters! (Hugs) Thank you!!  
Mika Saito: Ah, thank you! dat-angst-cuz: Thanks for your review, try to do so again, it's what keeps  
me goin'!  
Kenshin's sakura: Thankies Colleen! On to part three! K, I know you guys don't want to hear me talk any more, but please, if you  
want me to continue, you must REVIEW! ~Kida  
********************************************************* D stared blankly at Josh, slowly registering what it was the tech had said in response to his question about the phone call. "Hey, look it's not my fault ok? I promised my mom, and I didn't think she'd take me up on it while I was on the job! Jeeze! I'm sorry!" Josh cried angrily, before storming off to fume in a corner by himself. D continued to remain immobile, looking practically horrified. Seeing the shocked look on the Dunpeal's normally blank features, Nolt stopped playing cards with Meier (who became offended and immediately proclaimed victory for himself) and walked over to see if he could help. D snapped out of his stupor when Nolt's large hand descended onto his shoulder, nearly knocking him off balance. "Hey, what's wrong with you? You look really upset, what'd Josh say?" Nolt asked, looking concerned.  
  
D sighed heavily. "We're expected to baby-sit Josh's five year old sister for him tomorrow." D mumbled looking miserable, before turning towards the second oldest Markus brother to see his reaction to this truly dreadful news. Surprisingly, instead of looking unhappy, as D had expected, Nolt grinned broadly. "Hey, that's great! This'll be fun I love kids!" Nolt proclaimed, before walking off to spread what was, to him, a nice spot of good news. D looked disgruntled, "I shouldn't have expected sympathy from a human anyway....." He muttered resentfully, before turning around and huddling in a corner so that he blended in with the wallpaper.  
  
Nolt soon found, much to his dismay, that with the exception of Charlotte and Caroline he was the only fan of little children in the room... and Caroline didn't really count... she just wanted to eat them. Most of the others responded much in the same way D had, by looking severely disappointed and then marching over to vent their anger by verbally abusing Josh (who was soon seen running screaming from the room after cracking from the stress.) Everyone's mood was ruined and the group felt desolate and quite down, it wasn't even until an hour later that anyone noticed that D was missing. It was Leila who finally figured it out. She was looking for D to ask him to set a certain fact straight when she noticed that he seemed to have disappeared.  
  
"Hey, guys?" She called, and received a few cranky replies in return. "Has anyone seen D?" Meier sat up quickly, no he had not seen the dunpeal in quite some time and this was unusual...he was always there...like some big black cloud that was getting ready to ruin someone's picnic. "Who was last to see him?" The vampire asked looking ready for action of any kind. Nolt looked confused. "I did...about an hour ago, when he told me we had to baby- sit." Mashira surprised everybody by suddenly leaping up and exclaiming, loudly. "I knew it!! I knew I saw him leave behind Josh!! He must be out! The slimy basta** left us here!" What Mashira had, in fact, seen was Josh's shadow leaving behind him...(but I guess it's not too hard to mistake a shadow for D, after all it is black...and let's see um, black)... Over to the left in his corner D continued to blend in with the dark wallpaper, normally he would have told them where he was so that they would shut up, but this was just far too amusing to stop now.  
  
About an hour later Josh returned, having finally cooled down from all of the verbal abuse of earlier, he was looking forward to telling everyone that he had special ordered ice cream for them along with a scary movie. Yes, Josh was feeling quite pleasant until he entered the room and was tackled by Leila, which we all know would be a simply terrible experience and should be treated with mental health care straight away. "Oof!" Josh cried as the air escaped his lungs, hitting the floor knees first. He lay gasping and panting, as Leila sat on his back and rapidly fired questions at him, Mashira standing to the side and egging her on, in a not-quite- charming manner. Josh finally regained his breath and squirmed out from under the huntress. "What did you do that to me for?!?" Josh cried looking betrayed and hurt. "Haven't you even been listening!??" Leila cried. "D is gone!" Josh looked horrified...then passed out. Mashira snorted and looked peeved. "Well, he wasn't much help...let's just eat him." D decided that the joke had gone far enough, standing; he grabbed a pitcher of water off of one of the tables and walked over to dump it on Josh's face.  
  
Everyone present stared at D in shock as Josh came to, sputtering. "Where the hell were you?" Leila asked the dunpeal, looking menacing as her hackles began rising again in their strange Ashitaka-ish way. D gazed at her as though she were something unpleasant stuck on the bottom of his long, black, and exceedingly attractive boot. "I was sitting over there minding my own business, you should actually look for people before giving poor Josh a heart attack." Leila gave D a harshly offended look before stalking off, while Josh sat up and hugged D tightly crying. "I thought you were gone!" The tech sobbed, clinging to the dark hunter. "I could just see my boss, laughing maniacally, as he tore out my innards and threw them to the crows!" D felt highly uncomfortable, he was unused to being hugged at all, much less by sobbing men. He gently pried Josh off before sliding back over to his corner and sitting down, making sure he was facing everyone so that the issue wouldn't repeat itself.  
  
Now that all was calm once more Josh felt a bit better, he decided he would still treat the cast to ice cream and a movie and told them so. With the exception of Charlotte (who was dreading the prospect of a scary movie) they all seemed quite pleased with the proposed treat and awaited it happily. Josh walked out again, feeling better, telling the crew that he was going to gather them up some sleepwear. The gang lounged about on the newly provided couch/bed/things that Josh had gotten on sale (at a flea market), and looked over the survey cards that Josh had handed them on his way out the large steel doors. The cards had a list of four popular horror movies and a small description of each. They were to mark down which they would choose to watch and the one with the most votes at the end would win. (I know that you are all quite familiar with this drill but, sadly, the cast of VHD;B was not...it took Josh quite a while to explain it to them.) The choices were The Ring, The House on Haunted Hill, The Shining, and Evil Dead. D looked askance at the list, deciding that the descriptions made all of the movies sound quite undesirable to witness. "Why can't we just watch something happy?" He wondered sadly, as he randomly stuck a check mark next to The Ring.  
  
The Markus brothers were all sitting together on a large couch (...it looked quite ready to collapse), trying to decide what they wanted to watch so that they could all vote on the same thing. Four votes for one movie would nearly guarantee that they would get to watch what they wanted but, there was just one problem...Grove. Poor Grove was not truly in the mood for a scary movie and was trying to pick the least scary sounding of the lot...much to the despair of his brothers who wanted some horrid, ghastly, story of doom and terror. After much debating (whining from Kyle...) Borgoff convinced the others to go along with what Grove wanted to pick. Kyle looked sulky and wandered off over to the Barboroi, to see if he could cast a better vote with them. Grove finally chose the one that had only a vaguely scary description, The Ring. When asked why he had picked that one Grove just replied that nothing could possibly be scary about a little girl.  
  
The three Barboroi, and their recent addition of Kyle, were deciding between The House on Haunted Hill and The Shining. "I want to watch the haunted house one." Mashira stated simply. "And we're not gonna watch the Shining just cuz its got the word shine in it Kyle!" The werewolf growled, glaring as the red head opened his mouth to protest. Kyle looked pouty...he liked shiny things... "I'm with Mashira on this one," Caroline purred looking over her shoulder at the steel doors and wishing Josh would burst in so they could get changed. "I just don't think the other one sounds very good." She looked apologetically at Kyle before shrugging, and gliding to the doors to await Josh's return with pajamas. Kyle pleadingly turned to Bengee for support and Bengee glared at Kyle as though he was some despicable insect. "I'm going with whatever he doesn't want..." The shadow demon muttered as Kyle's face fell in severe disappointment.  
  
Meier pondered each selection as carefully as possible, wishing to be thoroughly entertained, while assuring Charlotte that if things became too frightening she was perfectly welcome to hide herself in the women's restroom. Charlotte looked less than reassured and glared at Meier's back while he decided upon The House on Haunted Hill. Fortunately, before Charlotte began chewing her distinctly odd (but attractive) boyfriend out, Josh returned with a varied assortment of pajamas. The sleepwear was passed out to everyone and most went into the restrooms immediately, to change out of their own grimy, overused clothing. Everyone looked so relived to be in the soft clean materials, that no one was even complaining of some of the more lurid color schemes (Charlotte's purple and yellow plaid for example). That is...no one was complaining until poor D stepped reluctantly out of the men's room. The Dunpeal looked distinctly unhappy in the neon orange teddy bear jammies, and no one could blame him, the footies at the bottom were just too dreadful, and the large pink embroidered "hug me" on the fuzzy stomach was just beyond contemplation. This was so awful that everyone at once felt pity, and cast their eyes away...except for Kyle, who looked as though he was going to die laughing. D stared at what Kyle was wearing before turning to Josh.  
  
"I believe he has my evening attire..." D murmured crossly, placing a pointed nail beneath a terrified Josh's chin, and gently turning his head towards the third Markus brother. Kyle had on a very nice set of black silk pajamas complete with a silken black robe. He looked very happy with the ensemble and was waving his good fortune in his older brothers faces, both of whom looked less than pleased with the situation. Borgoff had received a pair of blue and white striped, old fashioned, flannel pj's that made him look like he'd stepped out of the eighteen hundreds, and Nolt had gotten stuck with Scooby doo wear. Both looked disgruntled with their younger sibling and walked away, leaving him to the impending doom that was D. "Ack!" Kyle yelped as he was hefted into the air by the scruff of the neck. "Down!" Kyle shrieked in a panic. "Put me down!!!" He kicked and flailed pointlessly as D walked off towards the bathroom, the squirming red head held out in front of him.  
  
A few moments later the door opened and a stripped Kyle (with a towel wrapped tightly around his waist) was flung out onto his face. Cries of disgust followed this particular action, and people fled in various directions that led away from poor abused Kyle. Staggering upright, Kyle turned angrily to retort in some physical fashion, when the door opened again, and D sauntered out. Carelessly tossing his discarded teddy jammies onto Kyle's head, D neatly spun him around, shoved him hard into the restroom, and shut the door. "Nicely done." Bengee murmured appreciatively, "Not sure if I could have done it that fast." Mashira nodded in agreement and went to congratulate the handsomely dressed Dunpeal.  
  
Kyle re-emerged, looking dejected, after about thirty minutes, which were spent deciding whether he was going to come back outside at all. He slunk over to an unoccupied corner, and sat, staring unhappily at the fuzzy footies before attempting to rip them off. Borgoff and Nolt took this as an open invitation to make fun of their younger brother and headed off to do so while Grove tried to persuade them that Kyle had had enough. Josh managed to prevent any further happenings by bursting in through the door and announcing that the ice cream had arrived. This cheered everyone up a great deal, including Kyle, who soon seemed to forget that he was even supposed to be embarrassed. There were seven different flavors (chocolate, vanilla, cherry, strawberry, fudge ripple, lime, and peanut butter) along with a variety of ice cream type condiments (aka: whipped cream, choco syrup...). Everyone dug in looking pleased. Mashira grabbed the entire four- gallon tub of lime ice cream and walked over to his place by the soda machine, before beginning to down the contents. Looking disconsolate Borgoff and Caroline settled for cherry, seeing as wresting the lime away from Mashira probably wouldn't be worth it.  
  
D was silently savoring his bowl of chocolate and strawberry, smothered in whipped cream, he had never enjoyed such a sugary treat before in his life, and was determined to make the absolute most of it. "Hey...D?" D looked surprised for a moment before glancing down at the glove, still covering his left hand. "Yes?" D asked, before taking in another delicious mouthful of ice cream, and trying desperately not to squirm in delight. "You, uh...wanna let me out now?" D thought this over for a moment before responding nonchalantly. "No." Left hand let out a pitiful sounding sob causing Caroline, who was sitting to his right, to turn abruptly and stare at D with her spoon halfway to her mouth. Becoming uncomfortable, D turned away from her muttering. "If you shut up, I'll let you out for the movie." This seemed to calm left hand down and he silenced himself. D sighed happily and was just settling back to enjoy his ice cream some more when there was a disturbance back at the buffet table, laden with ice cream.  
  
"Damn horse!" Borgoff cried angrily, trying to pull D's horse's head out of the tub of vanilla ice cream (which he had been seconds away from topping his cherry sundae off with). It snorted, unhappy at being denied such a marvelous delicacy, and promptly slammed its back hoof into Borgoff's midriff. For about three seconds Borgoff stood perfectly still...then whimpered softly and collapsed. Bengee stepped over the prostrate form on the floor with only a vague amount of difficulty, and began refilling his bowl with fudge ripple. 


	4. The Child Arriveth!

(Disclaimer: don't own vhd; b...sigh)  
Fear the Fans To all of those who reviewed. I really appreciate everything! Your reviews keep me writing don't stop! I shall thank you all by name as soon as possible! Thank You!!!  
  
Josh staggered down the outside hallway on his trying path to the hospital section of the building. He nearly tripped and heard his companion give a pain filled groan. Borgoff whimpered in agony as he leaned on the tech, desperately trying to walk correctly. D had said that at least four ribs must be broken...he had then smirked and given some smart-assed remark about his horse being an exceptional animal but Josh hadn't caught that part. Josh grumbled and heartily wished that his boss would've allowed Nolt to come and help them, but sadly, his boss was one of those dipwads that thought techs could do anything if they just "put their minds to it".  
  
After about half an hour, Josh had finally managed to get the oldest Markus brother safely to the correct wing and had left him with the doctor. After being reassured that Borgoff would be fine by the next day, his ribs were bruised not broken, he left. He was wracking his brains trying to figure out what he was going to tell D. As he had been walking away from the wing, his boss had called him over the walkie-talkie to tell him that the horse was a danger and would have to go. "Why me?" Josh asked no one in particular as he once again entered the hall leading back to his room full of characters, he had not expected anyone to answer. "It's not just you, you know..." a female voice said reproachfully. "Oh, hey Colleen..." Josh muttered feeling a bit ticked that his angsty feelings had to be shared, after all, if one is going to angst, it always feels better to know that no one knows your pain...just ask Kamui.  
  
Josh stopped to look up (she was two inches taller) at the other tech, Colleen had short red-brown hair, and shinning hazel eyes, she was currently wearing her black and red Kenshin t-shirt... which was appropriate seeing as she worked in the next building with the cast of Kenshin himself. She glanced up too, and glared at him. "What're you complaining about anyway?" Josh sighed heavily. "That stupid horse that D's got nearly punched a hole through Borgoff's chest...and you?" He asked, looking curiously over to Colleen's left. He hadn't noticed until now but the other tech was dragging a very bored looking man behind her. Being unfamiliar with most forms of animation in general, Josh had no clue who the weirdo could possibly be. He was very tall and lanky, with a hand-me-down blue suit and tie, a crème colored shirt, a green fluffy style of hair, and a lopsided cigarette hanging carelessly out of his mouth. Colleen noticed Josh's stare.  
  
"Oh, this is Spike." She muttered tugging at his arm to get him moving. Spike yanked it back irritably and then looked casually uninterested, chewing his cigarette. "I thought he wasn't in your sho-" Josh began when Colleen cut him off. "He's not." She growled, shooting the green haired man an extremely angry glare. He raised his eyebrows in response, as though to ask, "What did I do?" Colleen looked horribly exasperated with her new responsibility and grabbed a fistful of his hair, resulting in his looking shocked. "He escaped somehow," The female tech explained. "He's supposed to be under the charge of that new girl, y'know, Jen? The crazy one who took two groups?" Josh did know, he remembered her signing in next to him one day, happily telling him about her charges from Cowboy Bebop and Magic Knight Rayearth...she seemed blissfully unaware of the horror that would await her from running back and forth, chasing escapees. "So he got out? How?" Josh asked, all of the doors were so securely locked...how had the weirdo gotten loose? "Oh, Spike just seems to have his ways..." Colleen muttered, looking resentfully up at Spike's smug grin. "He broke into my ward when I was getting water and tried to sell my cast packs of cigarettes that had SUPPOSEDLY been confiscated earlier." Spike flicked open a lighter and lit his cigarette. "I hid 'em." He murmured smugly. "WHERE?!?" Colleen yelled. Spike replied with a nonchalant shrug and a remote "Someplace..." Fed up, Colleen yanked at his hair and walked on. "OW! Goddamit! Leggo!" Spike cried but to no avail, Colleen had him. "No way, I'm taking you up front to have you strip searched you dork!" She cried, Josh watched as they receded down the opposite corridor, strong relentless tech, and loudly protesting cowboy.  
  
Josh re-entered the large double doors ten minutes later, only to be tackled by Grove, who tearfully begged him to say that his older brother wasn't going to die again. After re-assuring the youngest Markus brother Josh hurriedly took the vote cards so that he could get the movie started as fast as possible, while Grove wandered off and attached himself to the closest person possible for comfort...Mashira. The wolf-ish barboroi glanced questioningly down at Grove, who was tightly hugging him around the waist and looking mentally anguished. Mashira rolled his eyes and patted Grove's silver hair gently. This, however, became old after twenty minutes. Mashira, now bored, picked Grove up, walked him over to Kyle and Nolt, and dumped him, before returning to his favorite spot by the soda machine. After making a few tallies (and yelling at Kyle for filling in the whole card) Josh put on The Ring, and stepped back as the cast gathered around the large television to watch. The tech took this time to pull D to one side. "Yes?" D asked, anxious to get back to the movie, which actually looked rather interesting. "Um...its your horse..." Josh muttered looking apprehensively up at the Dunpeal, afraid of the possible reactions. "What about him?" D asked glancing over at the cyber horse who had, upon finishing the vanilla ice cream, fallen asleep on the air conditioning vent again. "My boss said he's not gonna be able to stay around...you know, since he's hurting people..." D cut him off with a swift movement of his hand, walked over to the horse, and tied his reins to a post by the wall. "There." D said simply, before returning to the movie. This was good enough for Josh, donning his jacket, he left for the night.  
  
Borgoff walked briskly down the hallway on his way back to the room the next morning at around eight, he felt refreshed and not in any pain thanks to that cool doctor. (Still felt a bit annoyed that his cigars had been confiscated though.) He hummed happily anyway as the random tech next to him glanced up, disturbed, and let him in through the large steel doors, locking them again behind him. At first the room looked completely empty, not a sound greeted him. "Um...guys?" Borgoff asked nervously, wondering if they had gotten to go somewhere without him. He was just beginning to feel lonely and abandoned when the cloth covering the table on the far right side of the room lifted, and Leila's face poked out from under it. Borgoff's panic was replaced with confusion. "Um...can I ask why-" Borgoff began, when Leila cut him off. "Get under the table or be live bait!" She cried before her face vanished back beneath the tablecloth. The oldest Markus brother's feelings quickly switched from confusion to annoyance, he had at least expected someone to have missed him... Looking peeved, Borgoff walked over to the table and snatched off the cloth in irritation...and was shocked to find the entire cast crammed under the table. After observing the fact that they were obviously terrified (the bug eyes and tense eye twitches) he took the liberty of gently prodding the table so that it tipped slowly before collapsing backwards. There was an instantaneous mad scramble to right the table, and within five seconds everyone was crouched under the re-set makeshift shield, shivering.  
  
"What the hell is wrong with you people??" Borgoff asked. "Meier, Nolt! You should be ashamed of yourselves! Come on somebody say something!" There was a long, awkward silence... Finally Borgoff noticed that they weren't even staring at him...they were staring behind him. Instantly on edge, he spun around to encounter...a wide screen television playing static. The oldest Markus brother raised an eyebrow at the group. "Was the movie that scary?" He asked, sounding concerned. He reached down under the table and tugged Grove out and then picked him up. Grove, who was shaking so hard he looked as though he was freezing to death, let out an ear splitting shriek when he was out from under the table, and clung to Borgoff like a leech. The steel doors took this opportune time to open and allow Josh entry. "Oh, good!" He said cheerily. "Glad you're back Borgoff, I've got pancakes on order and-" Borgoff turned around to display his suction cup style Grove, looking peeved. "Is this your fault?" He asked, pointing first to his youngest sibling, then to the remainder of the crew stuffed under the table. Josh looked shocked.  
  
"Wha?" He asked, tilting his head to one side and looking utterly lost. "They became frightened like small children." A soft voice stated simply. Josh and Borgoff turned to see D rise, he had been sleeping behind his horse. Meier was up in an instant, horribly offended. A verbal battle began between vampire and Dunpeal, it basically consisted of Meier's enraged screaming threats and D's one word replies every once and a while. Josh sagged. "Someone explain please..." He asked rubbing his temples to ward off a headache. Mashira slunk obediently over and huddled next to Josh's leg. "The evil little girl..." He whimpered looking petrified. "She crawls out of the fuzzy stuff on the screen!" Josh looked bemusedly down at the quaking werewolf. "She-she scared you guys?" Josh asked incredulously. "She actually scared you?" He looked surprised for another moment before doubling over in laughter. Leila flipped the table over as she stood in anger. (Not noticing that behind her there was another mad scramble to right it again.) "HEY! For all we know she could come out right now and kill us all!" She cried in passionate outrage, as Charlotte burst into tears behind her. Why? Josh asked himself...why me?  
  
Three hours later Josh had partially convinced the cast that what they had seen had not been real, though they had forced him to remove the television as a precaution. The pancakes had come in just in time and order (or a close resemblance) had been restored. Meier, who was drinking more medically supplied blood, this time laced with caramel coffee, was feeding Charlotte pancakes. Caroline and Leila were betting on who could eat the most hash browns, Leila soon won when Caroline began to turn an unnatural shade of turquoise green. Bengee and Mashira were pouring on whipped cream and strawberries with such abundance that their pancakes soon ceased to resemble pancakes. Kyle was drinking syrup straight from the bottle; he looked completely contented with the sticky, sugary, liquid and stated that he needed nothing else. Nolt, surprisingly, had proclaimed himself full after just two pancakes, though Josh personally thought he just didn't like any of it. Grove and Borgoff were stuffing themselves silly, eating everything they could get their hands on and fighting for what they couldn't. Grove's appetite had increased at monstrous rate ever since being given a functional form, and he seemed in desperate need of more food than was customary.  
  
D sat in a corner, as per usual, and slowly devoured his pancakes and whipped cream. Everything felt perfectly exquisite at the moment, he had more sugar, left hand was too terrified from the movie to come out, and Kyle was staying away from him (thanks to that nicely put execution threat that he had suggested to the rest of the Markus family). Yes, everything was wonderful...so naturally, it happened. There were three loud bangs on the metal door. Everyone stopped eating and stared. More banging followed, persistent, loud, horrible! Then began the whining. A shrill, high-pitched, full-throated, little girl whine emitted from behind the door. "Joooooooosssh! I here NOW!! OPEN!" The cast turned their eyes upon Josh in horror. Looking embarrassed, Josh rushed to the door, ignoring the pleading of the cast behind him to leave it locked. The door creaked open...and in it came.  
  
Josh's little cousin was a wiry, ragged, nasty looking child. Her dirty brown hair was in clumps and it looked as though she might have fought his aunt once or twice already since rising. She grinned, revealing lopsided braces that nearly resembled fangs, which brought no comfort to the group who stared in shock at the tiny monstrosity in front of them. "Hey, Nolt?" Caroline whispered. "What?" The larger man replied, not turning for fear of what the thing in front of him might do if he took his eyes off of it. "You like kids right? So go play with it or something...." Nolt shook his head. "I like kids not monsters." He murmured. The little girl looked around, her savage eyes viewing her prey, as though she was deciding whom she would make an example of...it appeared to be Mashira. "Fuzzy!" She cried, and leapt at the wolfish barboroi. Mashira recoiled in horror as she latched on to him and snuggled. "Fuzzy puppy man!" She cried gleefully, rubbing her face against his stomach with apparent joy. Mashira stopped struggling and looked down at the child...she wasn't doing anything particularly bad...ok, he wasn't exactly fond of hugs but seeing as he had expected to be mauled... Very gently he patted her hair. Soon almost everyone was crowded around the little girl, talking to her sweetly and offering her treats...they were under her control.  
  
"Great!" Josh exclaimed happily. "Glad you guys are so attached...bye!" And with that the tech slid out the door and was gone. Kyle, Borgoff, and D were staying as far away from the kid as possible. D despised anything younger than at least twenty and devoid of rational sense, and was therefore disinclined to go anywhere near her...even if it meant hanging out with Borgoff and Kyle. Borgoff just didn't like being pulled on and seeing as that was what he anticipated happening, he stayed away. Kyle on the other hand had had bad experiences with children, most just seemed to absolutely hate him, while others...attempted to hurt him, this kid looked like a classic example of the second category, therefore he wisely avoided her so as to steer clear of another mauling. The child, Becca, was at the time; happily climbing all over Nolt (who just sat there and allowed it) while Charlotte cooed nonsense at her and patted her head. D looked disgusted.  
  
"This is atrocious behavior." The Dunpeal muttered, glaring at the drooling gurgling, loud, horribly obnoxious abomination that was being encouraged by the shower of attention she was receiving. Borgoff snorted. "She should just be sent home, it's not like she's gonna enjoy the whole day here anyway.." The elder Markus brother grumbled. In truth Borgoff just wondered why the kid hadn't even come near them yet... Normally kids followed him around asking horrible questions like why, where, and are we there yet. This kid hadn't shown the slightest interest in them. Borgoff began to feel offended; the kid should like him just as much as Nolt, right? Deciding on this he stood and walked over to Becca, in order to become better acquainted. "Another one bites the dust..." Kyle sang under his breath while D nodded in agreement...then mentally slapped himself for agreeing with Kyle.  
  
Leila looked highly irritated as she corrected the kid again. "No! My name is Leila! Say it right! Lei! La!" The kid looked up happily and grinned a lopsided, sharp grin. "I luff yew too miss Lala!" Leila looked enraged while Bengee burst into another fit of sniggering behind her as she turned as red as her outfit. "It's not Lala!!" She fumed, getting ready to yell at Becca again; when suddenly Becca stopped grinning...she looked horrified. "Augh!" Becca cried, before dashing behind Meier to hide...everyone glanced up at Borgoff. "What?!?" He asked, looking baffled. Becca poked a finger out at the oldest Markus brother and cried shrilly. "Get the big scary man away!!!" Meier looked askance at Borgoff. "Now look at what you've done!" He cried, in a kindly noble fashion, scooping Becca up. "You've upset her!" Borgoff looked lost. "Why? What'd I do wrong?" Leila glared at him. "You heard the kid! You're scary, just like I've always said, now beat it!" Desperately trying to argue his case, Borgoff gestured to Meier, "Why isn't he a big scary man? He's a freakin' monster!" Then he pointed at Nolt. "Why isn't he a big scary man? Damnit, he's scarier than me!" He then swung his arm around to gesture at Bengee, Mashira, and D in turn, finally he encountered Leila. "Why the hell isn't SHE a big scary man??!?" There was a long and extended, awkward silence. "What did you say....?" Leila hissed, her eyes glowing evilly. Borgoff backed away, holding his hands up in defense. "I-I didn't mean that Leila...I-" Kyle stood. "It's an easy mistake to make though isn't it!" He called to his adopted sister before sitting down and chuckling at his "joke"...he was conscious for about three more seconds before the table collided with his skull.  
  
D stared at Kyle's prone form lying awkwardly on the floor with a sage contentment. At last the idiot was silent...all the idiots were mostly quiet as a matter of fact. Becca was napping and the rest of the crew were being extra quiet so as not to wake her, the kid might have her uses after all... 


	5. Out There!

(Disclaimer: don't own vhd; b...sigh I wish Urban Vision would create more  
merchandise...I be bummed.)  
Fear the Fans  
  
Thank you reviewers!  
Vanimaokatu: Thanks Jen! New chap!

Adalia Glenys: Finally! An update, here we go!

Chaotic Jinx: Glad you liked it so far; I shall continue to torture them  
for your enjoyment now.

Andrea & Seifer vanGriever: Thanks! Please, enjoy! I love repeat reviewers!

Little Giry: Yay! Thank you! Tell me what you like about this one! (

Kenshin no Sakura: Thanks Colleen, I tried to organize this chapter a bit  
better, hope you like it!

Blackjackkat: Here's numbah five! Yay-ness!

Cassandra Pegasus: Ye gads...I hope D never does encounter your brother, it  
would certainly be the end of one of them!

Terra Nova: Thank you! I liked your ideas so much, that I'm using one! Hope  
you like it!

Chibi Yin: Thanks for the review, please do so again, and tell me what you  
like!

Sailor Venya: Ooh! Thank you for the praise! (Loves applause!) Here's more!

Kitala: Thanks a bunch, Left hand is a horror isn't he?  
  
(((((((((((((((((((((((((((((())))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))  
  
Josh turned down the now familiar corridor, on his way to his otherworldly charges. Behind him, he dragged his tiny cousin, she was much happier than normal, skipping and singing in anticipation of being reunited with her unusual friends once more. Following the twosome was the gray haired janitor...the only one of the entirety of his species to exist in the large, elegant building. He was towing a hefty cart, covered by a tan colored cloth, which bumped unevenly on its wheels as it was tugged towards the room.  
  
Turning the bronze key in the old fashioned lock, Josh opened the heavy metal door and shoved Becca inside. The cart was wheeled in by the janitor and, after giving a wave of acknowledgement to Kyle, he tipped his hat politely and exited. Today would be a good day, Josh felt sure of it! He had given his clipboard reports to his boss, who had agreed that the cast members could be allowed a trip to the small private beach out behind the building.  
  
"That should make them all happy!" The tech murmured, looking pleased with himself as Becca gleefully danced over to Mashira, and latched onto her favorite "fuzzy puppy man"...she then bit him hard in the wrist but Josh chose to ignore that, and instead began conversing with the majority of the group about their outing.  
  
"Augh!" Mashira cried, as Becca sank her tiny kid teeth into his skin. He quickly shook her to the floor. "What the hell did y- you...BITE me for??!" He cried, looking more offended than hurt. Becca looked up at him with her sharp, lopsided grin.  
  
"I wantsta be a vamp-pire!" She squealed happily, prancing around the wolfish barboroi's legs before grabbing his tail and wrestling with it. Losing whatever patience he had had to begin with, the werewolf ended the game by slamming his tail, child and all, onto the floor. This did get Josh's attention, seeing as his small cousin's wail was better than an air horn. With a sigh he began heading over in the general vicinity of Mashira's soda machine. Bending down with an audible grunt, he hefted his screaming, kicking cousin from the midst of her tantrum on the floor, spun on his heel, and walked back out of the door. There was a mingled sigh of relief from the cast.  
  
Josh marched down the outside corridor angrily, clutching Becca's fist. Entering the elevator, he punched the button for the eighth floor while Becca protested loudly, wanting to turn back to her newly inducted playmates. Once they reached their destination the tech hauled his squirming charge into the children's daycare center. Getting down on her level, he hissed at her through clenched teeth.  
  
"If these people are injured my job is at stake!" He shook her firmly for emphasis. "Now you will stay in here until I come and get you for the beach trip, is that clear?" Becca nodded, looking put out but obedient...for the time being.  
  
"As I was saying!" Josh shouted, whereupon re-entering the room and trying to gather the cast's attention. "I have a surprise for all of you!" The possibility of a surprise encouraged the idea of listening to Josh, and the cast clustered around him. "I'm going to take you all to the beach!" He exclaimed.  
  
Complete and utter silence.  
  
Bengee cocked his head to one side. "The what?" He asked, looking baffled. Caroline crossed her arms over her chest, looking skeptical. "Is this going to be as much 'fun' as your movie?" She asked scathingly, voice laden with sarcasm.  
  
Josh blushed. "N-no, that was a mistake, this will be great. I assure you." He looked about awkwardly, wondering whether or not to unveil the cart yet, when D stood. "Perhaps," He murmured in his trademark monotone. "You could explain to us what a beach IS?" The rest of the cast muttered agreements, then turned expectantly towards Josh. "Um, well...its a lot of sand, right on the edge of lots of water...Its really relaxing, y'know. You can lie in the sun or there's waves in the water...stuff like that." Everyone stared blankly for a moment before an opinion was voiced.  
  
"Sounds cool," Leila said, standing slowly to ease a cramp in her side. "When do we go?" Everyone else agreed and began chatting amiably about the possibilities of this 'beach' they were to visit.  
  
Meier looked appalled.  
  
Swiftly, he slid over to the techs side and grabbed his shoulder, causing the younger man to jump about a foot. Meier tightened his grip until Josh let out a strangled squeak.  
  
"This beach? Did you say it was outside?" The vampire hissed as he shook the smaller man by the shirtfront. "Y-yes!" Josh wheezed. Meier looked enraged. "So what am I going to do?!?" The normally calm vampire bellowed, swinging Josh about like a straw filled puppet. "Stand out there and BURN?! You call that FUN?!" Meier whirled about to face the rest of the cast, all of whom had rushed immediately to a far corner so as not to be caught in this newly erupted line of fire. All who remained was D, still seated in the center of the room, looking uninterested.  
  
Meier panted for a moment before straightening, smoothing his hair, and overall regaining composure. He gently lowered Josh to the floor with a soft apology, before swishing off to Charlotte, with whom he immediately began discussing a possible solution to the problem. Meanwhile, Bengee had sidled over to the covered cart. Natural curiosity was getting the better of him and so he yanked off the tarp. "What...is all this?" He asked, wrinkling his nose with distaste as he pulled out a Speedo. The shadow demon tugged at the elastic swimsuit for a few moments before sliding the waistband over his thumb, pulling back to his shoulder, taking aim, and firing. People scrambled out of the path of the wayward swimsuit, until with a loud THWAP it struck home.  
  
Caroline slowly pulled the object out of her hair, allowing none of her anger to show, while Josh waved his arms in the background in a frantic attempt to stop what would happen next...sadly...he couldn't.  
  
Within point three seconds Bengee was dangling high off the floor, a long strand of green hair wrapped securely around his throat. He clawed madly at the makeshift rope before his head was slammed into the ceiling; Caroline then seemed to lose interest. Letting her teammate go she turned and walked towards the cart full of swim gear, ignoring the thump behind her, and the sympathetic winces crossing the other's features.  
  
"So..." She drawled, lifting out a pair of neon green trunks, which easily started to blend in with her arm. "Josh? Explanation?" Josh hurriedly walked to the cart in order to avoid more injuries, and began. "These," He said gesturing to the trunks Caroline held. "Are swim trunks...men wear them when on the beach- Yes?"  
  
D had raised his hand. The Dunpeal stood and stared down at the tech before commenting. "Where are the tops?" Josh looked at the quantity of clothing that most of the cast was wearing...and began to develop a sinking feeling. "Uh...the men normally just go shirtless..."  
  
"Really!?!" Caroline and Charlotte squealed, and then began giggling; Meier's face burned crimson and he turned away from the pair. "Well, yes..." Josh murmured, losing confidence fast.  
  
"I'm good with this!" Kyle called from his position on the buffet table, pointing to his costume..., which practically left him shirtless anyway. Leila made a disgusted face. "You mean we have to see even more of Kyle?.....Is that legal?" Josh glared at her, his nerves fraying quickly. "Yes, of course its legal, no there are no tops for the men. Now," He rummaged through the pile and came up with a VERY tiny blue bikini. "This is an example of women's swim wear it-."  
  
"Booyah!" Kyle exclaimed happily, before Leila whipped around and fixed him with a glare that could have melted steel. "I-I mean, uh...that's awful..." He muttered, subdued. Josh massaged his temples, needing more aspirin. Turning towards the cart, the tech began rooting through the swimsuits, twelve seconds later he came up with what he had been searching for, looking triumphant, he held it high.  
  
"This is a women's single piece swim suit...we only have one though." The tech's voice trailed off miserably as he glanced nervously over at the girls. Charlotte was gazing at him with a pleading look that could have tamed a rabid bear, while Leila and Caroline seemed more likely to charge and maul him. Thinking fast, he tossed it high into the air, it landed square in the middle of the girls.  
  
A beat.  
  
The war lasted for about three seconds. Grinning smugly, Caroline headed off to the bathrooms carrying her trophy; turning at the door she made a very rude hand gesture to Leila, and was gone. Leila seethed in anger for a few moments before disentangling herself from the hammock that had served as D's bed. The huntress nursed her bruises and moodily grabbed a bikini from the pile on the cart, then also moved off towards the ladies room.  
  
This seemed to be a cue to the others, who began to pick and choose swimwear. Meier was naturally looking for the longest set of trunks he could get his hands on, while Charlotte searched for the largest bikini available. The vampire finally turned up a respectable pair of royal blue swim wear along with a yellow orange bikini for Charlotte that was slightly less revealing than the others. Borgoff had found a pair of forest green trunks and decided they would do; all the while trying to ignore Kyle, who was continuously trying to convince other people to wear Speedos so that he could laugh at them. Kyle and Mashira had both chosen identical swimsuits, bright red with flames emblazoned on either side. Mashira looked proud of his choice and contemplated ripping Kyle's apart before deciding that the aforementioned choice would be a bad decision. Seeing Kyle in a swimsuit was bad enough, he did not wish to see Kyle without a swimsuit.  
  
Bengee had chosen a flashy yellow set of jams; it clashed horribly and caused seconds of blindness when observed too closely...naturally the shadow demon loved it. Nolt had gone with the biggest set available, and therefore wasn't granted much with color choice. Pink and yellow weren't really his thing, but so long as he had something to wear he wasn't going to complain.  
  
Grove was having a rough time. Though he was much healthier than before he was still very thin...none of the swimsuits seemed to fit. Feeling frustrated he slouched over to Josh.  
  
"What's wrong with you?" The tech asked, seeing that the youngest Markus looked miserable. "You ok?"  
  
"I can't go..." Grove muttered, glaring over at everyone else jealously. Josh stared at Grove feeling confused; the young hunter lowered his head in embarrassment. "None of it fits." Grove finally declared sadly, pointing towards the cart of beach clothes. "'S all too big..."  
  
Sighing heavily, Josh pulled out his cell phone. Ten minutes later the lone janitor appeared again, he was holding a Nordstrom's bag. "Thanks." Josh murmured, the janitor nodded and left. Turing, the tech handed the bag to Grove. "Here you go." He said happily. "See if that fits." Seeing as it was a child's size Josh hoped it would...otherwise he was going to have to get the poor guy a belt or something.  
  
D was highly disappointed. He had gone through all of the swimwear twice, and none of it was black. All of the men's swimsuits came in horrendously lurid color schemes, which made the Dunpeal cringe simply to behold them. There was NO way he was going to wear any of that! Looking up, the tech discerned the dark hunter coming toward him. He began to back away but decided that it was hopeless so he simply waited to hear what the Dunpeal would say. D towered over Josh, and glared down at him. Josh gulped.  
  
"Uh...need something?" The tech asked nervously. D reached out suddenly, grabbed the cell phone, flipped open the top, and placed it in Josh's hand. The tech stared incomprehensively.  
  
"I'd like to make an order." D murmured, gesturing over at Grove who looked much happier now, decked out in fire engine red trunks that, thankfully, stayed on. (He was the only one to emerge changed besides Bengee and Kyle thus far.) Josh looked taken aback by the Dunpeal's abrupt statement. What did he look like? A fast food take out guy? Before he could retort, D held up the pair of neon green trunks that Caroline had picked up earlier. "I would like these. In black." The Dunpeal stated curtly. Resignedly, Josh dialed the number for Nordstrom's information desk.  
  
"Hello, Nordstrom's clothing department, how may I help you?" Came the somewhat harassed voice from the other end of the line.  
  
"Um, yes. I'd like to see if you have any size 7 men's swimsuits in black?" Josh asked hesitantly, anticipating the answer.  
  
"Sorry sir. Black's just not a popular color for summer, how about blue?" Cringing Josh hung up the cell. D stared at him expectantly. "They, um...don't make black swim suits D." Josh whimpered. D automatically reached over his shoulder for his sword, only to find the empty casing strapped to his back. Now doubly irritated D quickly tugged at the sheath, loosened it, whipped it out like a sword, and held it over Josh's head.  
  
"Augh!" Josh cried, huddling up into a ball on the floor. "Don't hit me with that!!"  
  
"Hit him!" Mashira cried from across the room, before Borgoff smacked him in the back of the skull. No one really paid much attention as the pair began tearing at each other, it was just too commonplace. Meier took it upon himself to intervene, in the less hazardous of the two skirmishes. He gracefully slid in between tech and Dunpeal, and turned to the dark hunter.  
  
"D, why don't you just wear these?" He asked, holding up a pair of dark blue trunks, they were closer to being black than any of the other choices, though they couldn't stand up to the regality of Meier's peacock blue attire. "I'm sure it will be just as good, and won't damage your reputation any," The aristocratic vampire continued. "Just get a black towel and-" Here he paused for a few moments while the sounds of epic battle from Mashira's soda machine rose to an all encumbering crescendo, before dying away slowly to a muted background of vehement cursing and unhappy whimpers.  
  
Meier cleared his throat. "Get a black towel and you should be perfectly fine." He finished quickly, handing D the trunks and moving off to help Charlotte, who was attempting to see to Borgoff's injuries. D stared down at the dark blue swimsuit and allowed a small smile to cross his lips for a brief moment, then headed towards the rest rooms.  
  
"Just hold still! That's a nasty batch of cuts you have, you should let me help you." Charlotte commented firmly, as Borgoff tried, once more, to wriggle away. It was much easier for Charlotte now that he was staying in one place. She smiled up at Meier, who returned the smile affectionately...and continued to wrench the oldest Markus brother's arms behind his back to render him immobile.  
  
"I don't want any friggin' help!" Borgoff growled, trying to get back at Mashira, who was a mere five feet away calmly licking his wounded arm. "Just let me kill that stupid Barboroi!" Meier tightened his grip on the other man's arms. "You'll do as Charlotte says, human!" He muttered threateningly. "And you may not kill Mashira, he apologized, after all." Borgoff continued to grumble unhappily, but sat still, as Charlotte applied band-aids and salve to the long scratches on his face and chest.  
  
About half an hour later, the cast was mostly ready. D and Meier had matching black towels draped across their shoulders, the lack of clothing on their upper bodies making them feel self-conscious. D refused point blank to take off his hat, after hearing from Josh that the sun could cause slight burns he had become somewhat paranoid, and insisted on keeping it for protection. Meier was also carrying a large, blue and green beach umbrella, which would (hopefully) keep him from becoming a living fireball. Bengee, Kyle, and Mashira had dismissed towels as being utterly useless in the present situation and had declined the offer to partake of any, naturally forcing Josh to add three to the beach bag in case they suddenly changed their minds. Caroline had chosen a green tie dye style, she loved patterns she could blend with and this seemed an excellent specimen, while Nolt, reluctantly chose (again) the largest size available...leaving him stuck with the "dancing banana" towel. Grove was wrapped up tightly in his beach blanket, which featured various jungle cats on the front, and Borgoff and Charlotte chose identical blue towels with suns and clouds printed on them. (The oldest Markus was complaining about the stupidity of the pictures on the towels, until Bengee offered him a "hello kitty" print, then he shut up.) It was then that Josh noticed someone was missing.  
  
"Um, guys?" He asked, looking around to confirm his suspicions. "Where's Leila?" Everyone glanced about, noticing quite suddenly the lack of bickering and complaining in the room. Caroline snorted.  
  
"Oh her? Honey, she's still upset about losing this." She said smugly, gesturing to the single piece suit she was wearing. "She said she wasn't coming out." The earthen demon finished with a small laugh. Charlotte shook her head, walking over to the cart she picked up a nice mango colored towel, and walked into the bathroom. Leila was sitting moodily on a bench by the door, looking highly annoyed and resolute. "Are you going to come with us?" Charlotte asked kindly, taking a seat next to the huntress.  
  
Leila glared at her. "I'm not going out in front of all of those stupid men in this!" She spat angrily. "I can't believe that YOU did." She finished rudely. Charlotte just smiled in response.  
  
"They won't mock you." The noble woman continued kindly. "No one will say anything, trust me." Leila still looked undecided, so Charlotte stood and showed her how to wear the towel as a wrap. A few moments later, both girls exited.  
  
"Oh, good!" Josh said, feeling relived. "Now all you need to do is put on some suntan lotion and we can head on out!" So saying he began handing out bottles of spray on sun block, and face cream. Remembering the little "sunburn" sermon they had received earlier, the cast began applying the sunscreen.  
  
"I'm all sticky." Grove whimpered forlornly, as he finished putting on the greasy substance. He tried his hardest to keep his bangs away from his face, but they refused to obey, preferring to plaster themselves all over his visage. "Isn't it great!" Kyle called from his younger brother's left. "I love it! Sticky-ness! W00t!" Nolt rolled his eyes in annoyance and snatched Kyle's sun tan bottle, holding it high over his head so that his sibling was unable to reach it.  
  
D grimaced as he smoothed on an extremely thin coat of the disgusting mixture, hating the smell and texture, the only benefit being that he could put the lotion onto his left hand in order to spread it on. "Agh! D, stop!" Left hand cried as the Dunpeal poured more cream into his hand. "It tastes terrible! I SAID stop!"  
  
Bengee turned to see where all the noise was coming from just in time to see D's left hand devour the entire lotion bottle. Both shadow demon and Dunpeal stared at the hand incredulously. Bengee looked slightly ill and moved quickly away from D. The hand grinned in an irritating "superior" fashion, while its master glared down at the offending body part. D re- applied his glove.  
  
Meier spread coat after coat on himself and Charlotte, desperate to stop either of their bodies from burning. Caroline was already slicked down waiting by the door, laughing softly as Leila continuously dropped her greasy lotion bottle onto the floor. Mashira took two bottles and emptied their contents onto the linoleum; he then proceeded to roll in the coconut- scented mix until he was thoroughly coated.  
  
After many attempts Borgoff flung the sunscreen bottle away, angrily. The stupid stuff was just too damn hard to apply to himself; it couldn't possibly be worth the effort of trying to work it around all of his hair. Standing he moved toward the giant metal door with the rest of the group, signifying that he was ready.  
  
"Ok!" Josh said, turning the key in the lock. "Let's go!"


	6. On the Sand Pt1

(Disclaimer: don't own vhd; b…sigh I wish Urban Vision would create more merchandise… We need Markus Bros. Stuff!!.)

Fear the Fans

Thank you reviewers!

Little Giry: If I can find you a dancing banana towel you shall have one.

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I'm stupid get over it: I will not get over it, if you reviewed my fic it proves your intelligence. (Preens feathers) Again I'm sorry for the long wait, here is a new chapter for you…review pathetic me! (Heh, if you feel like it.)

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Moving down the corridor with such a large amount of people was terribly strange. Josh was used to taking them in a rush all alone, not moseying casually along in a pack! Every few seconds Josh's line of sight would flicker nervously over to Bengee. The shadow demon had sworn that if ANY chance of escape whatsoever showed itself, that he would be gone in a flash. So far though, everything was tightly locked and secured, all according to plan.

"Why are we going upstairs?" Bengee whined, his already annoying voice reaching a new and even more irritating pitch.

"I told you." Josh sighed, feeling exasperated. "We need to pick up Becca, and the elevator's broken."

"Your cousin?" Bengee asked, sounding disgruntled. "Why can't we just leave her where you stashed her?"

"Because my Aunt told her that I'd take her to the beach, if I don't, she'll tell and then my Aunt and my mom will kill me." Josh growled, glaring at Bengee as the shadow demon curled his lip with a derisive 'as if we'd care about you dying' look on his face. Josh shook his head in disgust before reaching out and grabbing the back of Kyle's suit, in order to prevent the hyper active man from prancing down the wrong hallway.

"Eeaugh!" Kyle yelped, as Josh's precautionary action gave the red head a large, unintended wedgie. He hurriedly yanked down on the trunks to return them to their former state, while Caroline sniggered behind him. The rest of the cast trooped slowly up the staircase, looking grumpy and uncomfortable. With the exception of Bengee and Kyle, all of the men had their towels wrapped around their chests, feeling exceedingly embarrassed by the lack of clothing. Meier had Charlotte wrapped up in her towel like Leila, insisting that she keep 'unwanted eyes' off of her, while Caroline preferred to walk about showing off her one piece. Nolt had his 'dancing banana' towel wrapped around his torso and looked horribly displeased. He had discovered upon leaving the room that the horrendous pattern was printed on both sides, leaving him with no way to hide the disgustingly happy tangoing fruit.

Finally, the cast reached the eighth floor and moved quickly down the corridor to retrieve Josh's monster er- I mean cousin. Josh was slightly taken aback as the employee within thrust Becca out of the room with enough force to send her careening into Mashira, before slamming the door in his face. But he quickly shook off his surprise and led the characters back down the stairs towards their destination.

Becca happily skipped about, swinging her small beach basket back and forth, and reaching up now and then to yank on the towels of unsuspecting cast members. She enjoyed seeing what reactions she would get from which people, and especially loved the awkward squawk of anger she received from Meier as she sent his towel fluttering gently to the floor. "Yay!" She squealed with glee as Meier blushed furiously, perfectly aware of Leila, Caroline, and Charlotte's stares riveted on him (Not that he minded the last one too terribly…it was the first that really had him worried.)

There were only a few other mishaps on the short (but seemingly perilous) journey to the small side door in the back of the building, including Bengee's small escapade with the can of spray paint he nicked off of the janitor's cart. Finally the crew approached a small wooden door with nothing more than a tiny chain latch keeping it shut, a strange salty aroma blew gently through some of the cracks. The cast stared apprehensively as Josh removed the latch, and the door swung open.

"Ooooooooh." The small crowd behind the tech murmured appreciatively. The beach stretched off into the west for about a mile, consisting of fine white sand and sparkling clear blue water, which twinkled appealingly in the rays of the morning sun.

"Aaaaraaahahahahaaa!" Kyle cried, intoning one of his freakish expressions of enjoyment, (and shattering the beauteous serenity…) before racing headlong at the water, shoving two people who were unfortunate enough to be in his way flying, and diving in.

Shaking their heads and feeling riddled with embarrassment, the rest of the cast followed at a more sedate pace, pretending not to know the reckless Markus brother.

Spike lifted his head out the sand slowly, expression unchanged so as to not give away the well of anger burning inside of him. How dare that random idiot knock Spike Spiegel over?!? A lanky violet haired woman, the other victim of Kyle's charge, sat up as well, rubbing the back of her head and spiting sand.

"What the hell was that?" Faye grumbled, glaring out at the three people in the water, and quickly spotting the most 'excitable' of the small group. Her suspicions were confirmed almost instantly as she watched her partner turn towards the same red haired man and glare. "Should we kill him now?" She asked, sounding careless as she rose to her feet, flicking sand from her bikini top. She watched Spike shake his head, and, with a shrug, followed him off to the large group of newcomers.

Meier was breathing heavily, trembling and shaking, he had yet to step onto the sand, and was still huddled up under his beach umbrella in the doorway.

"Meier, darling, come now!" Charlotte wheedled softly, tugging at Meier's arm. "We applied so much of that sunscreen, and you have your umbrella, you'll be perfectly fine." Her soothing tones finally won the aristocratic vampire over, and he timidly headed out into the sunlight, umbrella held tightly over his head. The sand was hot, but to Meier's immense surprise, he didn't burn! Brightening immediately, the vampire gazed around, admiring how different things looked in the sunlight, as he followed Charlotte over to a more secluded portion of the dunes to set up their umbrella.

Caroline had only just spread out her towel to rest on when a shadow fell across her. Glowering, she sat up and received a pail full of salty water in the face as a reward.

"Kyle…" She snarled, standing slowly, having identified the culprit by the smothered sniggering.

Josh ignored the loud screaming behind him as he walked over to the only other beach umbrella and sat down under it. The other two people turned to look at him.

"Oh, hi Josh." Colleen muttered, trying to keep her eyes on the three people from her cast of Kenshin who had been allowed outside. "Did your entire cast get out here?" She turned to watch Josh nod, before stifling a laugh and gesturing to the other umbrella inhabitant. "Jen was only allowed to bring out the Bebop people, the Rayearth cast was acting up again…especially that little green haired dude." The other tech, Jen, had long chestnut brown hair tied into a ponytail…but it looked frazzled and unkempt, her hazel eyes expressed annoyance with her cast members, and her renaissance-esque outfit was practically ruined.

"I'm ready to go back in now." Jen muttered, something like how Josh would expect a half awake zombie to sound.

Colleen placed a comforting arm around her comrade. "Don't worry, I'll watch your morons." She said soothingly. "You can get some sleep." Colleen had hardly finished this sentence when Jen fell over, dead to the world. Josh looked concerned for a moment before Colleen shooed him away by chucking sand in his face.

Staggering back up the beach as he wiped sand from his eyes, Josh nearly collided with two scowling people standing in the shallows. Finally ridding himself of the grit, he gazed up at them, wondering what moron had decided to make all anime people so freakishly tall. One of the aforementioned was obviously the 'Spike' he had met before; the other was a lean, purple haired woman with far too much skin showing. Both were managing to glare angrily and look satisfied all at once. Curious, the tech turned to see what they were staring at, and quickly dashed over to the spot.

All that could be seen of Kyle was his braid, which Caroline had decided not to bury; the rest of him had been shoved unceremoniously into the ground. Josh got down on his knees and began shoveling sand until he had unearthed the other mans head. Kyle gasped air for all of two seconds, before he began yelling every curse word he had ever learned, repeatedly. Josh felt annoyed and, spotting Nolt, dragged him over to finish the job.

"Excuse me?" Charlotte asked pleasantly, glancing up at the handsome dark-haired man standing over her.

"I asked if yeh wanted to go for a walk." Sanosuke repeated as he pushed his fluttering red headband out of his charmingly handsome face, completely entranced with Charlotte's beauty. "You don't have to of c-"

"She most certainly does NOT want to go!!!!" Meier yelled, sitting up suddenly and glaring at the cocky young human.

"Whoa! No need to get offended grandpa!" Sanosuke said quickly holding up his hands. "I'm not a stalker or anythin' I would never hurt your beautiful daughter!"

Meier's mouth fell open and his eye twitched with the rage that was quickly bubbling up inside of him. He was about to explode with offended anger when Sanosuke boldly grabbed Charlotte's wrist and raced off as though he were being chased by demons, Charlotte screaming in his wake.

Borgoff stared in confusion as a shrieking Charlotte was dragged bodily past him, a laughing tall guy had her wrist and seemed intent on not letting go. Unwilling to become a participant, Borgoff shook his head, shrugged the sequence off, and continued down toward the pretty blonde girl with a long black trench coat standing by the waters edge.

Meier was filled with fury; no one had ever so blatantly insulted him in all of his long life! Forgetting all else he started off after Charlotte.

He made it about three steps before bursting into flame.

The shrieks of anger and pain soon had everyone's attention as Meier hurled himself back under the umbrella, rolling frantically back and forth to put out the inferno. Singed and seething, he looked for the closest person to him, and spotted Bengee's physically painful swimwear.

"Bengee!" Meier hissed. "Come here NOW!" Knowing better than to hesitate when the vampire was in this mood, he dropped his boogie board and hurried over.

"What?" The shadow demon asked nervously. "I didn't do anything I swea-"

"I know you didn't!" Meier snarled. "That- that boy! Stole Charlotte!"

Bengee looked nonplussed.

"I want you to go get her back!" The vampire growled. "Kill him if you have to." Bengee brightened at once, killing was fun! Grinning he sank into the shadows and vanished.

Nolt had finally finished digging his younger brother out of the sand. Shaking his head ruefully at his still cursing sibling, Nolt slung the sand coated red head over his shoulder and headed down to the waters edge to wash the grit off. After tossing Kyle into the waves Nolt turned to the pair behind him, Mashira and Grove, who were happily working on the moat of a beautiful sandcastle together. Grove waved cheerily as the wolfish Barboroi continued tunneling under the castle to create a secret entrance. Ed sat off to the side watching the two dig energetically, she had asked them to build it in the first place, occasionally performing slow motion versions of an odd break dance while clutching a corgi tightly to her chest with glee.

D sat in a beach chair in the shade of a sand dune, he felt relaxed for the first time in ages, so naturally a catastrophe of minor constitutions was necessary to spoil everything. A high pitched squeal rang out to his immediate left…D felt his good mood dissipate rapidly as a pretty black haired girl charged over the hill toward him, a shorter red haired man in tow.

"Look Kenshin!!! There he is!" Kaoru cried joyfully, pointing to the sunbathing Dunpeal. The ebony haired girl raced over to D, dragging the unfortunate Kenshin face first through the sand behind her.

"Oroooo!" The swordsman cried in terror, directly before his head struck a stone of ill fortune protruding from the sand, which knocked him cold…Kaoru didn't seem to notice.

Sighing exasperatedly, Colleen shrugged the sleeping Jen onto the beach blanket, before trudging off down the dunes to rescue Kenshin from the ill fortuned rock.

"Hi beautiful, what's your name?"

The tall blonde in the black trench coat and midnight blue bikini, stood slowly and gracefully before turning and smiling at Borgoff, who was trying his absolute hardest to look dashing. (Oblivious to the fact that it was not possible for him to be so…) Before she raised her sunglasses from her dazzlingly beautiful eyes and set them on top of her shining mane of hair.

She gazed through him for a moment before focusing on his face and smiling that dazzlingly pretty smile once again.

"I'm Julia." She murmured with a small good-natured laugh.

"Who are you?"

Spike's head jerked up abruptly. His 'someone's-going-near-Julia-and-I-automatically-must-seek-out-and-destroy-them-this-instant' radar had just gone wild! With complete disregard for anyone around him he snapped upright and pounded off to the left, heedless of the fact that he mowed down Grove and half of the sandcastle in the process.

"No! No! Noooooo!" Ed squealed with anguish, racing over to the half decimated construction and prancing about unhappily. "Ed's wonder palace go blam! Bad Spike-person nono!!"

Mashira gasped for air as he succeeded in pulling himself out from the collapsed tunnel. Shaking hard to dislodge most of the sand he looked about for the others, spotting Ed and Ein, he began scanning for Grove. He didn't have to look long, the youngest Markus was clutching his bleeding nose and sobbing just behind a fallen turret.

"You gonna live?" Mashira asked, gazing concernedly about his sandcastle-building buddy. When Grove continued to cry unabashedly, the wolfish Barboroi stood and carried him over to Nolt and Kyle, at a complete loss as to what else he could do.

Sanosuke had finally stopped running, tossing Charlotte into the small alcove he had located on an obscure section of the beach; he sat down for a breather, careful to block the entrance so that his charge couldn't escape.

"How ya doin' brown eye?" He called to the disgruntled woman. "Y'ok sweetie?" He was answered with a snarl or rage and a flung shoe. Rubbing his jaw where he had been struck Sanosuke gave a rueful smile. "Feisty? Rawr!" Just as he began moving forward he halted, a strange look on his face as something tugged at the back of his head; baffled he turned to look behind him.

There was nothing.

Raising his eyebrow in confusion the brown haired man looked awkwardly around his immediate area. Before giving a shocked "Uuughgh!" and collapsing onto his side in the sand, curled up in a ball and gasping as his hands instinctively covered his groin to protect it from further attack.

Charlotte smiled happily as Bengee stepped out of the shadows and began beating the man on the ground playfully; like a cat toying with a small mouse.

"That's enough now." Charlottes said, grabbing Bengee's hand to forestall any further injury on her captor. "Can you take me back to Meier?"

The shadow demon looked as though he was seriously considering this statement for a moment before turning away from the aristocratic woman and continuing to gleefully torment Sanosuke.

"What happened?" Nolt asked worriedly as Mashira handed him his sobbing sibling. Mashira pointed unhelpfully at the vanishing dust cloud that was Spike, before walking back to the sandcastle with Ed in tow to attempt repairs.

"For the last time Meier!" Josh pleaded, "Just tell me what happened, ok? Where's Charlotte?" The tech watched as the vampire seethed visibly, far too angry for words. Caroline was gazing at her former employer while slurping on a soda, wondering how much longer it would take for the vampire to explode.

"My name's Borgoff, Borgoff Markus."

Julia smiled again. "That's a nice name." She murmured, smiling winningly, laying a hand on his shoulder, and just all around playing the vixen, wondering how long it would take for Spike to turn up. "I don't think I've ever heard it before."

The oldest Markus blushed crimson, not knowing how to respond. Women normally ran from him, either screaming in terror/disgust, or laughing uproariously at the fact that he had bothered to try and hit on them. Why was this woman being so friendly?

He wasn't forced to puzzle over the situation for long.

Spike cannoned into Borgoff with an insane roar of fury, and pulled a gun out of his hair all in one swift movement.

Colleen randomly chose this moment to unintentionally spare the allured his life.

"So THAT'S where you've been hiding things?!?" Colleen shrieked, appearing out of nowhere and yanking Spike up by his fluffy green hair with an awesome show of inhuman strength. "In your HAIR?!?"

Julia looked scandalized and sidled off without anyone noticing. Borgoff just lay on the sand, wondering if he was really still alive or not. Spike twisted and writhed in increasingly mad attempts to break free of the tech's strong grip on his hair.

"Leggo a my hair woman!!" The cowboy screamed, half in agony, half in blind rage.

"Hell no!" Colleen responded, sounding diabolically gleeful. "I'm gonna convince Jen to let me shave your head!" Spike's look of shocked disbelief was priceless to anyone who didn't favor him too terribly highly, therefore Faye, who had just caught up, collapsed to her knees; guffawing.

Borgoff trudged over to his brothers, feeling absolutely humiliated. Kyle leapt on the expected bandwagon at once.

"Aww! Poor Borgoff can't get a woman!" The red head cried gleefully, prancing around his older brother and yelling obscenities. Nolt shook his head pityingly and turned back to Grove, who seemed much better and was ready to go back to the sandcastle to help with repairs.

Jen had been awakened rudely by Colleen and Spike exchanging vehement insults.

"Meh?" She asked in a small, confused tone as Spike was hurled down onto the beach blanket and unceremoniously sat upon.

Her confusion continued to increase as Colleen began to laugh maniacally.

"What do you want?" D muttered exasperatedly. He didn't like it when women came this close to him; they normally started crying and begging him to save someone or other.

"AAAUUGGHH!" Kaoru said simply, before flinging her arms around the hunters' neck and sending both of them toppling to the sand.

Leila shivered, the water was absolutely freezing! How on earth were Mashira, Bengee, and Charlotte having any fun? The other woman and the shadow demon had arrived about half an hour ago, just in time to stop Meier from inadvertently slaughtering Josh. After she had calmed her pale lover down a bit Charlotte had decided to go for a swim, though Meier continued to watch her closely to make sure that the moron from before didn't return. Mashira had taken a break from castle building for the time being and was enjoying riding the waves and paddling around in the salty water. They were all having fun but her! It just wasn't fair. Why was this beach place so absolutely miserable?

A large wave crept up behind Leila during her musings and dunked her soundly.

Becca sighed heavily with boredom. After a highly frustrating twenty minutes of attempting to annoy Edward and just having her own jokes thrown back on her along with a corgi, Josh's cousin was beginning to feel dispirited, it was too hard to annoy people here.

The big waves scared her, so she couldn't go in the water, that stupid bratty orange haired girl kept throwing that revolting little dog on her every time she went near the sandcastle, and funny frilly vampire looked like he was asleep! How could she possibly have any fun here? Becca dug into her beach basket, looking for a coloring book and crayons when her hand closed around something metallic and cool, grinning devilishly, Becca pulled the magnifying glass out of her bag and snuck off quickly into the dunes.

D jumped up as though he had just had something slimy and smelly flung into his face. Expression turned down into disgust, he shoved the violet haired girl to the ground and turned to walk away, only to find that she had attached herself to his ankles.

"Aww, look D." Left hand muttered with a grin, as his host scowled above him, desperately trying to kick the girl off of his left leg. "Doris reincarnated."

This seemed to hit a nerve, Meier watched in puzzlement as D tried to kick a girl off of one leg while repeatedly smashing his left palm onto a sharp rock.

Becca slunk around the sand dune until she was directly behind the funny frilly vampire…this was going to be sweet!


	7. On the Sand Pt II

(Disclaimer: don't own vhd; b…sigh I wish Urban Vision would create more merchandise… We need Markus Bros. Stuff!.)

Fear the Fans

Thank you reviewers!

Darksparrow2: Dear dear, it was not my intention to injure you…you should probably punish that chair. I hope you enjoy this chapter in a less painful manner.

Melissa Danielsen: Thank you so much for your kind words of encouragement…as opposed to the threats some give me!

Red6523: Plez? Oh, very well. I go on with it.

Nobel Silver Dagger: What a name! Chibi politicians? Oo Goodness me! I'd hate to have to sic Borgoff-san on them; I suppose I'd better write more then!

A-chan: (Pats on back until choking ceases) Well you frightened me! I'm glad you found it so amusing though, tell me what you think of this one!

Little Giry: Ah, my faithful reviewer! Meier reacting will be intriguing…

Andrea and Seifer vanGriever: Wow! Good to hear from you guys again! (Watches them turn blue) Er…come now chaps, please breathe…

Vamp-Huntr-D FAN: (Bows deeply) I'm happy to please, sorry that my updates are so staggered but I've been very busy getting ready for college, the next one should be sooner, tell me what you think of this one!

Azimel: I'm not so sure about channeling Battousai…but he will figure more largely in the next chapter (Wink!)

Adalia Glenys: Thank you so much for bothering to tell me what you think! I know this chapter is somewhat short, but I'll have the next one up soon!

Bad speeling man: Again your comment is appreciated, do stop back again.

Mannariel: (Evil grin) Embarrassment is key… Sorry about the long wait, tell me what you think about this one, the next chappie should be up soon; sorry about the lack of D in this one, he's headed for something big next chapter.

Cage no chou: Colleen! Thank you! Here's the next one!

Chaotic Jinx: You, Becca, and Kyle could easily maul the world in as little as three hours. I fear you! Update your story soon please! I want my Borgoff-san! (Cries a sad cry) Ah well, tell me if you like!

Grove sighed, the sandcastle was rebuilt but he was beginning to feel slightly irritated by Mashira, who acted far too much like a toddler, when he was wound up, than Grove could approve of. Edward, as much as he appreciated knowing someone with a truly admirable sense of humor, was not on his level of thinking and disliked thoughtful discussion. Walking slowly through the surf, Grove headed over toward the mass of people in the center of the beach, hoping to find someone to talk to.

Bengee watched the youngest Markus brother approaching with an overly happy expression scrawled on his face.

"What are you staring at?" Caroline asked, raising her head from her formerly languid position; resting on a surfboard. She eyed her cohort's gleeful facial features and cast a dubious eye in the direction he indicated. Grove was still strolling down the beach, smiling softly and taking silent pleasure in the simple fact that he was walking. "Oh come on…" Caroline hissed at Bengee, shoving him in an exasperated fashion. "That one's all right, leave him alone, go beat up his hairy brother if you're bored."

Bengee scowled at Caroline, he was losing support from all of his allies! Mashira was out to make friends like a big puppy, what had happened to his swift violent friend of old? Meier was content to do nothing but sit on the sand and cuddle that damn human, and D wouldn't so much as listen to him…much less help him kill things for sport. Now even Caroline wasn't up for slighting the humans.

"I don't feel like beating up the hairy one." Bengee muttered, feeling extremely put out…as much fun as it was to laugh at someone's misfortune by yourself, it always made you feel more superior if there was at least one other person laughing behind you…this would lessen the fun somewhat. "He's too easy to knock about." Caroline snorted with mirth, she knew that Bengee just didn't want to go after Borgoff on his own, without Bengee's shadow stabbing abilities, Borgoff was far more than capable of beating the shit out of her fellow Barboroi.

"You just don't want to get your ass beaten in." Caroline murmured, returning to her former cat-like position and closing her eyes.

Stung by the comment and, what he considered the loss of a friend Bengee slid off through the water toward the silver haired figure receding down the beach.

Sanosuke regained consciousness slowly. Shaking his head and feeling dizzy, he attempted to gather his bearings.

"Where the hell am I?" He muttered croakily, gazing around at the beach and trying to remember how he could have gotten there. Slowly he began to realize that this must be the place Colleen had been preparing to take then, it wasn't so special…looked like every other beach he had ever been to…

Another piece of information was whizzing about in the back of his brain, Sanosuke struggled for a few moments, in the attempt to catch it. Finally grabbing hold Sano froze.

"That weird green haired dude…" Sano muttered, shoving the loose ends of his red headband out of his face. "He sold me a..a…cigarette." Sano rubbed his forehead and gazed around, suddenly realizing that his crotch hurt like hell. "What was IN that thing!" He yelped, dancing on the spot until the pain receded. Blazing with sudden indignant fury Sanosuke limped back toward the crowd of people, an image of Spike Spiegel clearly forming in his mind…holding a 'shoot me' sign.

Leila coughed and sputtered, trying to regain her breath after the severe dunking delivered unto her by the most recent wave. Something, aside from the gallon of salt water residing in her lungs, was not right… She gazed down at herself and gave a miserable cry of despair; her bikini top was unaccounted for.

Grove wiped sweat out of his eyes, the beach was fun but did it have to be this hot for them to enjoy it? He was suddenly very glad that he had put on sunscreen…even if it had made him revoltingly sticky.

"Hey!"

The youngest Markus sibling glanced up at the shout, looking out to his left he saw Caroline sitting up on her surfboard and waving at him. Only hesitating for a moment Grove waved back, the Barboroi had seemed to be a pretty good lot. Now that they weren't being paid to kill his family, he saw no reason to be impolite…even though he still felt mistrustful of the plant woman and Bengee… Caroline continued waving.

"What is it?" He called, shading his eyes in order to relieve them of some of the glare. She was pointing to his left; something seemed to be moving in the water. "What the heck is that!" He yelped scrambling quickly for higher ground as Caroline's voice reached him.

"You might want to move!"

Spike gazed out across the pleasant landscape; resenting it for being so happy. Grabbing another drink out of the cooler half buried in the sand beside him, he popped the top, took one sip, and flung it away, taking vindictive pleasure in the sudden burst of outraged cursing from the tall wolfish man that the container had hit.

"You wanna stop that, Spike?" Asked the man sitting on his right, as he removed the cooler from his partners' reach. "You're wasting good food and drink."

"Shut up, Jet." Spike muttered, reaching up and scratching his significantly shorter hair with a miserable look on his face. "I feel like being unpleasant."

"Look, I know you're pissed at that Colleen girl for taking off most of your hair but you did kind of deserve it. Imagine, you had your cigarettes and your gun hidden in it the whole ti-"

"I said SHUT UP!" Spike roared. Angry aura flaring, the man with the green buzz cut stormed off, leaving Jet behind on the sand; desperately suppressing a laugh.

Meier tried to relax. Charlotte was sleeping with a blissfully happy expression on her beautiful face right beside him, he had his umbrella, and could see the world in sunlight…shouldn't he be happy? Sighing, the aristocratic vampire shifted position; attempting to get comfortable and enjoy this time spent with his beloved…but the others were making it hard. Mashira was still screaming and cursing, trying to get the person who had hit him to own up and take what was coming to him…wasn't it obvious to the Barboroi that, when faced with an angry werewolf, no one in their right mind would own up?

Meier was most assuredly annoyed.

"Mashira!" The vampire watched as Mashira slowly let his screeching tirade die and turned to face him.

"Yes master, can I help you?"

"Yes, you can call me Meier and you can shut up!"

"Oh."

Mashira deflated visibly.

Meier rolled back over to face Charlotte, snuggling down and feeling much better. He began to drift off, completely unaware of Becca's evil Cheshire-like face hovering over him.

Sanosuke arrived, out of breath and feeling humiliated, in front of the group of people. Limping forward he began to head over to the large clump by the water when he heard the groaning. Staggering toward a rock he peered over cautiously.

"Kaoru?"

Sano gaped. His best friend's girlfriend was tied to the rock and gagged, her hair was mussed and she looked pissed.

"What happened to you?" The pained swordsman asked as he untied her. "Where's Kenshin?"

Kaoru spat sand. "I don't know where Kenshin is…my memory's all fuzzy…but I remember a…a cigarette, I-" Her head jerked up suddenly and her eyes narrowed. "What was IN that thing you gave me!"

"I didn't know there was something wrong with it!" Sano protested hurriedly, backing up slightly. "I got beat up too!"

After a few minutes of heated discussion and resurfacing memories, both swords people sat; rather abashedly, upon the ground…staring at their feet.

"I can't believe I kept attacking that poor man." Kaoru whispered, turning beet red. "No wonder he tied me to a rock…"

"At least you didn't drag him to a cave, hold him prisoner, and then get the hell kicked outta your crotch by one of his freaky friends…" Sano offered. Both stared at the ground again.

"We should apologize." Kaoru muttered.

D shook the handle on the frail looking door violently.

"It's locked, D," His hand said smugly. "Lets just go back out to the beach and hang out, that blonde chick with the trench coat was pretty hot."

D continued to attempt to get back inside. Overheating in a matter of seconds, water filled with salt, mad women, talking to people, all of this was supposed to be entertainment was it? He rattled the handle again…he was getting out of here. He didn't know where he was going…but it wouldn't be here.

Nolt was feeling irate. He had ditched his dancing banana towel with Kyle, and was now standing in the surf, trying to feed D's horse an apple. The beast shivered, frightened of the strange surroundings, and just huddled closer to the second oldest Markus brother.

"Why do I have to get stuck with the horse?" He muttered, patting the beast on the muzzle in a vain attempt to calm it. "Can't we just tie it to the fence again? I think it's had enough exercise…" The horse seemed to think it had had enough exercise as well, and was edging back towards the dry sand. It would have been a horrifically inopportune time to attempt to ride the poor, frightened equine… Fortunately Nolt had seen this and had suggested politely to a harassed looking Dunpeal, that someone be put in charge of keeping the horse away from some people…like Kyle. Nolt had NOT intended for himself to wind up minding the beast, and the Dunpeal's remark had stung.

"_If you're so worried about the various ways your brother might get himself killed again, why don't you handle the…problems?"_

Nolt had refrained from mentioning that he had been trying to protect the horse and not Kyle, but D had seemed so pissed that, at the time, it was pointless to draw attention to that side of the issue.

Nolt's thoughts were interrupted by a sharp scream off to his right, and the resultant action of the jittery horse's hoof landing squarely on his foot.

Becca smiled and hummed 'row row row your boat' under her breath as she pulled a large, beautifully gilded magnifying glass out of the pocket of her stylish beach cover-up. Her head turned to stare down the beach, expression pulled into vague surprise at the shrill scream from the direction of the water. She whipped back to her intended victim as he began to move and quickly shuffled into a crouch behind the vampires' beach bag…she would NOT be denied her fun!

Josh rubbed the side of his head ruefully, what could possibly have gone wrong now? Everyone had finally been calming down and then his cousin vanished and that odd scream had rung…what the hell? Spike trudged past him looking about as thrilled with life as a neutered dog, Josh felt vaguely sorry for the cowboy…though he had deserved what he had been given… Josh's train of thought was interrupted by a sudden, different scream from further up the beach…accompanied by smoke…Josh ran.

Kyle sighed and stretched languidly, gazing out at the gently rolling waves and clear blue water. For once the red head felt peaceful, not wishing to disturb or piss off anyone…an exceedingly rare time indeed. Paddling his fish shaped raft in a slow circle he looked around, over to his right he could see Caroline.

"Sexy green babe…" Kyle mumbled, thinking he might paddle over and attempt a chat, his raft continued to spin with the gently drifting tide. Mind still on Caroline, Kyle nearly missed Leila…she was only about eight feet from him, her back to him, crouched up to her neck in the water. "Hey, Leila," Kyle called lazily. "What's happni- huh?" Leila had given him a startled look over her shoulder and, crouching lower, had mover quickly away. "Hey!" The red head cried, paddling after her.

"Go away, asshole!"

Kyle grinned and sped up, he loved a challenge…even an obscure one.

Meier beat at the small flames on his left leg. They went out quickly and the aristocratic vampire felt distinctly embarrassed at having shouted so loudly over something so small. He gazed suspiciously up at the umbrella, wondering if it had torn in any places when he let out another sudden shriek as his right ear burst into flame. Charlotte put the tiny fire out, looking frenzied.

"Oh Meier, darling! I'm so sorry, maybe we should go back inside…" She rested her beautiful head on his shoulder in an attempt to soothe him. Grudgingly, the vampire allowed himself to be coddled in front of Mashira, who was not even bothering to suppress his mirth…(it really was revolting how that mouth in his abdomen tended to bark along with the Barboroi's laughter), in order to please Charlotte.

The sound of racing footfalls attracted their attention to Josh, who was running up the beach front with Borgoff in tow, if there was a fight to break up the tech had NOT wanted to be the one to resolve it, and had grabbed the eldest Markus for that reason.

"What's………the…p…problem?" The tech gasped; pop-eyed, staring around as though expecting to see that the Nightmare Before Christmas cast had been let loose to wreak havoc.

"Nothing much," Charlotte replied, stroking Meier's shoulder. "Just a small accident." She put her head to one side and laughed softly to clear the air…directly before her hair caught fire.

"C'mon Leila, come here!" Kyle called in a pitch of voice that he knew others found horrendously annoying…slimy, and alluring. "Why're you leavin' me all alone?"

"Kyle…I SAID back off!" Leila snarled in barley-contained rage, looking over her shoulder at him as she moved further into the ocean. "I don't want to talk to anyone right now!"

"Why not…?"

"Go suck cock, man bitch!"

Kyle looked startled; THAT had stung something awful.

"Are you saying I act gay?" The red head asked, still collecting his wits from this alarmingly barbed verbal assault.

"Sure, if it'll make you go away." Leila muttered, face flushed with anger, and that strange thrill humans receive from cursing at others of their species.

"Well… Well, FINE!" Kyle exploded, smacking the water in irritation, turning his fish shaped raft around and paddling off in a huff to see if Caroline was still floating about somewhere.

Leila sighed in relief, that had been too close for comfort, the last thing she needed right now was for Kyle to tell the whole beach she was topless…she noticed a slight tugging around her claves and suddenly realized how far away the shore seemed. Struggling desperately, it dawned upon the huntress that this was most probably that 'rip tide' that Josh had mentioned. Her struggles became more intense until she was practically flailing at the water.

"Oh crap… Kyle! Kyle, come back!" She shrieked, trying to paddle after his receding form. If he heard, he took no notice.

"Mashira…please shut up." Josh's muffled voice pleaded, his face was buried in his hands. The werewolf's barking laughter was grating and it made the tech's stomach turn to watch the extra set of jaws moving in tandem to the laughter of the Barboroi. "I really need to think about what to do…"

Meier and Charlotte were standing under their umbrella, arms around each other and looking enraged…enraged Charlotte was a frightening thing…Josh hoped never to have to bear witness to it again. Mashira was flat on his back guffawing at the idiocy of the lover's expressions when the found out what had been causing the flames, and Borgoff was sitting off to the left, looking repulsed, and holding Becca at arms length while she twisted and bit in an energetic attempt to escape.

"You obviously need to take that…that…THING back inside before IT causes any further damage!" Meier growled.

"She's causing further damage right now, damnit!" Borgoff interjected, hissing between his clenched teeth as Becca sank her fang-like canines into his flesh between forefinger and thumb. "OW! Holy-"

"Becca! Enough!" Josh cried, yanking his cousin away from the now fluently cursing Borgoff and grabbing both of her wrists. "I'm calling Colleen to take you inside right now!" He said angrily, shaking her slightly for emphasis. "Go sit on that blanket until she gets here or you really will be in trouble!" Becca, looked furious, but obeyed, however sulkily, sitting down hard on the blanket; clutching her magnifying glass.

"Maybe we should go inside too…" Borgoff muttered, nursing his injured appendage. "All I've gotten out of this trip so far are more near-death experiences…"

Josh nodded in agreement, he would have to round the others up, shaking his head he stood. "Watch Becca, ok Borgoff?"

"Like hell I will!" Borgoff yelped, snapping upright. "I'm going to find my brothers, get that pansy-assed vampire to watch your monster!"

"What did you call me!" Meier fumed, watching the eldest Markus brother stomp off.

"Ignore him, dear." Charlotte murmured. "He's in pain and probably just worried about his family…I haven't seen Grove in a while, have you?"

Meier looked thoughtful. "No…but then I haven't seen D or Bengee for a while either…" His voice trailed off.

The two uprooted the umbrella immediately and headed quickly down the beach.

Josh sighed resignedly and sat back down, glaring at the bright day before him as a well-aimed pebble bounced off his skull.


End file.
